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^»^* '»ENIMORE COOPER'S GRAVE 

AND CHRIST GHURCHYARD 




RALPH BlRDSAil, 



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AND CHRIST CHURCHYARD 




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FENIMORE COOPER'S GRAVE 
AND CHRIST CHURCHYARD 



BY 

RALPH BIRDSALL 

Rector of Christ Church, Cooperstown 

Illustrated from photographs 

by A. J. Telfer, J. B. Slote, and 

W. H. Yates, of Couperstoivn 



NEW YORK 

FREDERICK H. HITCHCOCK 

MCMXI 



Copyright, 1911 
By Ralph Birdsall 



^CI.A2S9/97 



CONTENTS 

Page. 

Fenimore Cooper's Tomb 7 

At Cooper's Grave 11 

The Founder of Cooperstown 15 

The Tomb of Father Nash 23 

The Story of the Cliurchyard 29 

Orientated Graves 37 

A FroHcsome Epitaph 40 

Churchyard Miscelhmea 43 

A Churchyard Funeral 60 

The Church 64 



Fenimore Cooper's Tomb 

No other famous tomb is quite like Cooper's 
^rave in the quahty of surprise which it excites in 




Photo by Telfer 



" The path well worn by the feet of pilgrims " 



every visitor. The stranger, entering the gate of 
Christ churchyard in Cooperstown, looks about him 
for some conspicuous signal of Cooper's sepulchre. 



8 



Fenimore Cooper s Tomb 



He anticipates some boastful monument, commen- 
surate with the author's fame, standing high 
above all else, flaunting its claim for homage. 
But this he seeks in vain. An obelisk standing 
on the margin of the driveway commemorates 
a more homely celebrity, the pioneer priest of 




*A marble that bears upon its surface no 
tribute to fame " 



Otsego forests. Toppling gravestones everywhere 
are inscribed with unknown and long-forgotten 
names. 

But when the stranger chances upon the path 
well worn by the feet of pilgrims, and stands 
at Cooper's grave, he divines that the expectation 
is rightly disappointed. It is far more impressive 



Fenimore Cooper s Tomb 9' 

and affecting to find it so. It is not the simple 
tomb which is at fault, but the expectancy' of its 
being otherwise. No proudly glittering monument 
marks the grave of Cooper, but a plain, recumbent 
slab of stone. It is a marble that bears upon its 
surface no tribute to the fame or virtues of the 
dead; only his name, with the dates of birth 
and death. No insignia of the author's craft 
are carved thereon, nor Indian emblems sugges- 
tive of his famous tales; only a small and simple 
cross, the symbol of the faith in which he lived 
and died and found assurance of immortality. 
It is a grave that claims for its charge no higher 
place than any among the dead. He does not 
eclipse the soldier, lying near, who died for his 
country upon the field of war. The tomb of 
the aged slave, beneath the same sod asleep, is not 
less notable. Old neighbors who exchanged the 
friendly nod with him in life are not less honored 
now. Hands lie still beneath the sward that 
gripped the axe in mighty strokes of pioneering 
enterprise. So rests, in like obscurity, the hand 
that with a pen blazed trails in a new continent 
of romance. 



At Cooper's Grave 

Poem written for the Cooperstown Centennial by the Rev. Walton W. 
Battershall. D. D.. rector of St. Peter's church, Albany, and read by the 
author at the tomb of the novelist. 



Around the marl)le, sculptured with the name 
That gave long echoes from the mantled hills, 
AYhich frame the glittering mirror of the lake, 
Throng presences of olden time and type. 
Plastic with life, shot through with mortal blood, 
Living for evermore in that vast hall 
Of Imagery, beyond the touch of death. 

Above the grave of Cooper, stalwart soul 

And clean, that fought his fight with trenchant blade 

For faith and ruth, and died, marked with the Cross, 

No fairy footfalls twinkle in the grass. 

As in the great magician's Summer Night 

Of impish frolic and bewitched sleep: 

The creatures of his brain that haunt the spot, 

And hail the wizard of the tangled wood 

And fretted wave, were men, carved in the flesh. 

Borne on, or underneath, the wheel of life. 

With love or guile or dedicated vow 

Sweeping their spirits like a harper's hand. 



12 Fenimore Coopers Grave 

Of those who told the stories of the world. 
There are, who pushed their caravels across 
Forgotten or uncharted seas of time, 
Discovering new continents of thought 
And phantasy. Of such art thou, the seer 
And recreator of the vanished life 
Of the primeval forest of the West, 
Where, in the brooding silence and the shades 
Pierced by uncertain glimmers, thou didst see. 
Or seem to see with visionary eye, 
Ulysses in high council with the chiefs. 
Or Hector flying from Achilles' spear. 

The world thou didst discover is thine own: 
No footprints didst thou find except thine own. 
And theirs, whose stealthy feet and dusky forms 
Move in thy epic story, like that throng, 
Impassionate, wrought on the Grecian urn. 
Of which the poet caught the immortal rhythm. 

What chance, or trick of brain, or subtle law 

That links things by their contrast, brings the grave 

Of him with dreamful eyes, whose name is writ 

In the warm marble of his chiseled verse, 

And not in water, as he dying, moaned, 

Beside the grave of him, who put his own 

Unquenched fire in virile shapes of life. 

Peopling the wilderness, and who now lies 

In the sun's laughter rippling o'er the lake.^ 



Fenimore Cooper s Grave 13 

The old world and the new! The same old play 
Of manhood, greed and stress of circumstance, 
Whatever the setting and the pageantry! 
He gave new accents to the ancient tale. 
And deftly wrought the assemblage and the march, 
And staged the drama, of creative days. 
In which the Empire of the West had birth, 
And men, shai:)ed in the clash of wild frontiers. 
Whose moulds are broken, fought for a continent. 

Fair Glimmerglass! he hath enchanted thee, 

And filled with dreams thy sleep amid the hills. 

The footprints of that fateful fight are on 

Thy marge and, in the moonlight silvering 

Thy face, glide spectral shapes. The Muskrat's ark 

Creeps in the faint breath of the silent night. 

Big Serpent, son of Uncas, holds his tryst 

Sharp at the appointed sunset on the rock 

Hard by the serpent river's leafy source. 

And Hist, the Honeysuckle of the Hills, 

Hears in the Huron camp his squirrel-note. 

Still, in the twilight of soft summer eves, 

Sweet hymns and orisons float on the air 

From the canoe of Hetty, as she prays 

Over her mother's grave beneath the lake. 

And now, as in those storied days, Judith, 

The Splendid, queens it in her tragedy, 

W^ith warm, brave eyes, facing the Nemesis 

Of her inheritance and fatal dower. 

As the night deepens and the stars burn clear 



14 Fenimore Cooper's Grave 

Like beacon -fires, we catch the ciuiet voice 
Of Deerslayer, him of the straight tongue, white 
In thought and deed, the moccasined Parsifal, 
Making his argument for tortured death 
To keep the word he pledged the torturers. 

Here, in the mystic beauty of the lake. 

To which he gave life's pathos and its might. 

Which crept into his youth and haunted him 

Across the seas, nor played him false, but breathed. 

When he brought back to it his crowned life. 

Its gracious balm on his unbroken force. 

He sleeps, in shadow of the shrine, in which 

He read the riddle of that mystic sleep. 



The Founder of Cooperstown 

CooPERSTOAVN received its name not, as the 
casual visitor might suppose, in honor of the 
novehst, but from his father. Judge Wilham 
Cooper, who was the founder of the village. 
The close of the Revolutionary War opened the 
western frontier of New York to peaceful settle- 
ment, and offered an inviting field of enterprise 
to such a man as William Cooper, whose life in 
the quiet town of Burlington, New Jersey, was 
fraught with dreams of adventure and speculation 
in the conquest of the wilderness. 

In 1785, through conveyance from the sheriff 
of Montgomery county. Cooper acquired, in the 
region of Otsego lake, at a cost of about fifty 
cents an acre, some 30,000 acres of land, originally 
part of a patent issued by the colonial govern- 
ment. On horseback, and alone, he rode through 
dense forests to the source of the Susquehanna, 
and carefully explored the region of his purchase. 
"I visited the rough and hilly country of Otsego," 
he afterward wrote to a friend, "where there 
existed not an inhabitant, nor any trace of a road; 



16 The Founder of Cooperstoum 

I was alone, three hundred miles from home, 
without bread, meat, or food of any kind; fire 
and fishing tackle were my onh^ means of sub- 
sistence. I caught trout in the brook and roasted 
them on the ashes. My horse fed on the grass 
that grew on the edge of the waters. I laid me 
down to sleep in my watch coat, nothing but 
the melancholy wilderness around me. In this 
way I explored the country, formed my plans 
for future settlement, and meditated upon the 
spot where a place of trade or a village should 
afterwards be established." 

Cooper was so impressed with the possibilities 
of the Otsego district that he extended his posses- 
sions in the adjacent patents, and began to set 
forward his plans for colonization. He induced 
settlers to follow him, and in 1786 forty thousand 
acres of land which he offered for sale were taken 
up within sixteen days. No other settlement 
undertaken after the Revolution met with such 
immediate success. Cooper had a genius for 
this sort of enterprise, and a capacity for leader- 
ship that made him all but king of his new world 
He knew how to satisfy the needs of poor settlers. 
He found means to protect them in days of 
famine, and contributed from his private purse 
to the common welfare. He opened a store of 
supplies, and gave credit to the settlers. He 



The Founder of Cooper.sfown 17 

marketed for them their first commercial pro- 
ducts. He knew the crops that were best adapted 
to the soil and climate. He led and instructed 
the settlers in the art of building roads and 
bridges. He laid out a plan of the future village, 
and the streets of the present village follow lines 
which he then set down. 

Superior to the colonists in intelligence and 
education, Cooper yet possessed qualities of what 
might be called sportmanship that won both 
the loyalty and affection of the sturdy' pioneers. 
This trait is illustrated by a characteristic story 
that Cooper once offered one hundred and fifty 
acres of land to any man on the patent who could 
throw him in a w^restling match. Tradition 
says that one contestant was finally successful, 
and the land was duly conveyed to the victor. 

Some idea of the commanding position which 
Judge Cooper occupied in the village which he 
founded may be gained from Fenimore Cooper's 
novel. The Pioneers, in which, while historical 
accuracy of incident or character is disclaimed. 
Judge Temple is easily identified as a kind of 
idealized Judge Cooper. 

Encouraged by his success in Otsego, Cooper 
became a speculator in land, on a large scale, 
throughout Western New York. He established 
permanent settlements where others had failed. 



18 The Founder of Cooperstoivn 

and, in the process, built up a fortune. In his 
later years he wrote: "I have settled more acres 
than any man in America. There are forty 
thousand souls now holding, directly or indi- 
rectly under me, and I trust that no one amongst 
so many can justly impute to me any act resem- 
bling oppression. I am now descending into 
the vale of life, and I must acknowledge that 
I look back with self-complacency upon what I 
have done, and am proud of having been an 
instrument in reclaiming such large and fruitful 
tracts from the waste of the creation." 

Cooper possessed remarkable insight concern- 
ing the potential energies of newly settled regions, 
and with a large vision of the future foresaw^ 
and advocated the construction of the Erie 
Canal. His ability and versatility attracted 
men of parts to visit him, and his home in Coopers- 
town became a famous center of hospitality. 
Well known men of the times w^ere frequently 
his guests. Exiled foreigners sipped Madeira at 
his table. Talleyrand once was entertained by 
him and indited verses to his eldest daughter. 

Cooper had the accomplishments of the English 
countrj^ gentleman and himself composed verses 
in the conventional manner of the times. A 
specimen of these appears on the tomb of the 
daughter celebrated by Talleyrand. Her grave 



The Founder of Coopersfown 19 

lies between the tomb of her father and the 
stone that commemorates Colonel Richard Cary, 
one of Washington's aides. She was killed by 
a fall from a horse, in 1800, in the twenty-third 
year of her age. Her brother, Fenimore Cooper, 
afterward wrote of her that she was "perhaps 
as extensively and favorably known in the middle 
states as any female of her years." The wooded 
eminence which rises at the west of the village 
is named in her honor, ''Hannah's Hill." 
These are the verses which her father composed 
and caused to be carved upon her tomb, without 
inscribing, singularly enough, her name, which 
was not added until many years afterw^ard: 

Adieu! thou Gentle, Piou.s, Spotlefs Fair, 

Thou more than Daughter of my fondest care; 

Farewell! farewell!! till happier ages roll. 

And waft me Purer, to thy kindred Soul. 

Oft fhall the Orphan, and the Widow'd poor 

Thy houniy fed, this lonely fpot explore; 

Here to relate, thy .seeming haplefs doom, 

(More than the Sole)n)i Record of the lomb. 

By tender love infpired, can e'er portray, 

(Sor fculptur'd Marble, nor the Plaintive lay. 

Proclaim thy Virtues thro' the vale of time) 

And bathe with grateful tears, thy hallow'd Shrine. 

In the political life of the times William Cooper's 
capacity for leadership naturally gave him an 



20 



The Founder of Cooversioirn 



important place. He became the first judge 
of Otsego county, and served two terms in Con- 
gress. Politics, amid the unsettled conditions 
of the frontier, offered a field of effort as adven- 
turous as the work of taming the wilderness. 




Photo liy Telfer 



" Here lies the foremost pioneer" ■ 



In December, 1809, while leaving a political 
meeting in Albany, after a session abounding in 
stormy debate, Judge Cooper was struck on the 
head with a walking stick by a political opponent 
and died as a result of the blow. 

Recalling the storj' of his career, one is disposed 
to claim for Judge Cooper's dignified sarcophagus 



The Founder of Cooperstown 21 

in Christ churchyard a share of the attention 
bestowed upon the tomb of his more ilkistrious 
son. For here hes the foremost pioneer of 
Cooperstown, notable among the frontiersmen 
of America. 




Plioto by Telfer 

" Inscribed to the memory of Father Nash, first rector 
of Christ Church " 



The Tomb of ^^ather Nash 

Shaded by venerable pines and noble elms, 
there stands in Christ churchyard a marble shaft 
inscribed to the memory of ''Father Nash, first 
rector of Christ's church" and "Mrs. Olive, 
wife of Father Nash," whose bodies lie beneath 
the sod awaiting the day of resurrection. Among 
some three hundred tombstones arrayed upon 
the greensward, vainly struggling, with the 
decrepitude of age, to hold themselves erect 
and to keep alignment in their ranks, the mon- 
ument of Father Nash, as one enters the drive- 
way gate, most commandingly appears, and 
reveals him to the fancy as captain of the army 
of the dead. From the church nearby, of which 
the dead form the silent guard, the congregation 
strolling homeward passes by this tomb, and the 
visitor who pauses to read its inscription may 
look back through the open door-way into the 
sanctuary where Father Nash in lifetime led 
in prayer and praise, and preached the Word, and 
broke the Bread of Life. It is this relationship 
of his to supernal truths that compels assent to 




'Ojj 



■i H 



The Tomb of Father Nash 25 

what the monument seems to assert in according 
to Father Nash, within this consecrated ground, 
a certain supremacy which the standards of the 
world would perhaps deny. In this view, a 
striking contribution to the harmonies is found 
in the admirable restraint expressed in the 
simplicity of the world-famous tomb within the 
same enclosure. While Fenimore Cooper's grave 
is. sought each summer by a thousand pilgrims 
who never heard of Daniel Nash, yet the novelist 
is here commemorated only as a humble Christian 
and parishioner of the church near which his 
body lies, and the monument of the founder 
of American romance is thus distinctly subor- 
dinate to that of the lowly priest of Otsego forests. 
This grave of Father Nash reveals a vein of 
poetry in a nature otherwise absorbed in the 
drudgery of frontier life. For it is by his own 
choice that the missionary pioneer is buried 
here. The very spot beneath the pines was of 
his choosing. That he should care whether after 
death his cold limbs be laid at rest here or yonder 
marks him for a man of sentiment. In him was no 
pride of common sense demanding what it matters 
to a corpse whether burial be here or there. He 
was a man not ashamed to profess a sentiment 
quite barren of utility. Merely it stirred his 
imagination to reflect that, as he lay in his narrow 



26 The Tomb of Father Nash 

bed beneath the sod, the pines above would 
whisper orisons to sunny skies, and with tossing 
phones beat time to dirges through the wintry 
night; the church bell now and again would make 
the earth vibrant with solemn sound, and foot- 
steps overhead of w^orshippers old and young- 
would pass, going to and fro; while through the 
ages, in the church nearby, Christ's Eucharist 
would be ever offered, uniting in mystic fellow- 
ship the quick and dead. 

In the history of Western New York the Rev. 
Daniel Nash deserves a place among the foremost 
pioneers. Wherever the most adventurous men 
were found pushing westward the frontier of 
civilization, there was Father Nash, uplifting 
the standard of the Church. Not only had he 
courage and indomitable energy; he displayed 
remarkable foresight in his manner of laying 
foundations. Nearly all of the parishes in the 
Otsego region were established by him, and most 
of them flourish at the present time. Outside of 
his work in Otsego, Father Nash made frequent 
missionary journeys westward through Madison 
and Chenango counties, southward through the 
Broome and Delaware regions, eastward to Mont- 
gomery, and north through Oneida and Jefferson, 
to Ogdensburg in St. Lawrence county, one hun- 
dred and fifty miles to the north of his Otsego home. 



The Tomb of Father Xash 27 

Bishop Philander Chase visited Otsego county 
in 1799 and gives a vivid impression of the more 
tlian apostoHc simplicity of Father Nash's sur- 
roundings. The I5ishop found the missionary 
living in a cabin of unhewn logs, into which he 
had recently moved and from which he was about 
to remove to another equally poor, inhabiting 
with his family a single room, which contained 
all his worldly goods, and driving nails into the 
walls to make his wardrobe. The Bishop assisted 
the missionary in his moving, and describes- 
how they walked the road together, carrying a 
basket of crockery between them, and "talked 
of the things pertaining to the Kingdom of God." 
In his missionary journej^s. Father Nash rode 
on horseback from place to place, often carrying 
one of his children, and Mrs. Nash with another 
in her arms behind him on the horse's back, 
for she was greatly useful in the music and re- 
sponses of the services. Mrs. Nash is described 
by a contemporary as "an amiable lady of benig- 
nant mind and placid manners. " 

Father Nash is the original of the Rev. Mr. 
Grant in Fenimore Cooper's novel. The Pioneers, 
but while the author of the Leatherstocking tales 
has well represented the genuine piety of his 
model, he has, perhaps purposely, disguised him 
as a rather anemic and depressing person. Father 



28 The Tomb of Father Nash 

Nash was a man of rugged health, six feet in 
height, full in figure, over two hundred pounds 
in weight, of fresh and fair complexion, wearing 
a wig of longish hair parted in the middle, and 
dressed always, as circumstances permitted, with 
a strict regard for neatness. 

The slightest sketch of Father Nash would lack 
symmetry without some reference to the well- 
known story of his answer to a farmer who asked 
him what he fed his lambs. '' Catechism, " replied 
Father Nash, "catechism!" And behind the 
smile that followed this homely sally the analyst 
of character would have seen the earnest purpose 
of his mission to the children of Otsego that was 
one of the sublime secrets of his ministry. 

"No Otsego pioneer deserves honor more," 
says Mr. Halsey, in The Old New York Frontier, 
"not the road builder or leveller of forests, not the 
men who fought against Brant and the Tories. 
To none of these, in so large a degree, can we 
apply with such full measure of truth the sayings 
that no man liveth unto himself, and that his 
works do follow him." 



The Story of the Churchyard 

I never can see a chnrchyard old, 

With its mossy stones and mounds. 
And green-trees weeping the nnforgot 

That rest in its hallow'd bounds; 
I never can see the okl churchyard. 

But I breathe to God a prayer. 
That, sleep as I may in this fevered life, 

I may rest when I slumber there. 

Our Mother the Church hath never a child 

To honor before the rest. 
But she singeth the same for mighty Kings, 

And the veriest babe on her breast; 
And the Bishop goes down to his narrow bed 

As the ploughman's child is laid. 
And alike she blesseth the dark brow'd serf, 

And the chief in his robe arrayed. 

And ever the bells in the green churchyard 

Are tolling to tell you this: — 
"Go pray in the church, while pray ye can. 

That so ye may sleep in bliss." 

—From Chri.sfiau Ballads, hy Bishop Coxe. 

Christ chi rch, in Cooperstown, is surrounded 
by one of the most i^icturesque country church- 




o 

O 



The Sforij of the (liurchyard 81 

yards in America. Not comparable in antiquity 
to the churchyards of Europe, it has yet a quaint 
and venerable aspect, and there are certain views 
of it, like the vista through the cloister, that are 
reminiscent of the Old World. 

Burial grounds in connection with churches are 
not so common in the country districts of America 
as one might suppose. They are found only 
about the churches of the oldest parishes. In 
early days, when the population was thinly 
scattered over a wide area, and settlers were 
separated by distance and bad roads from any 
place of public worship, small family burying 
grounds in the fields began to be customary, and 
cemeteries at convenient points along the highway 
were sometimes used in common. This tendency, 
together with a growing regard for sanitary 
precaution, hindered the multiplication of church- 
yard burial grounds, and brought about the 
establishment of public cemeteries. The religious 
sentiment, which prompted the burial of the dead 
as near as might be to a sanctuary, gave way to 
practical considerations, and churchyard burials 
became infrequent. 

Susan Fenimore Cooper, daughter of the 
novelist, in her Rural Hours, published in 1851, 
has this to say of Christ churchyard : 

"The oldest tomb belonging to the good people 



32 The Story of the Churehyard 

of this little town lies within the bounds of Christ 
churchyard, and bears the date of 1792. It was a 
child who died of the small-pox. Close at hand is 
another stone l)earing a date two years later, and 
marking the grave of the first adult who fell among 
the little band of colonists, a young man drowned 
while bathing in the lake — infancy and youth w^ere 
buried before old age. At the time these graves w^ere 
dug, the spot was in a wild condition, upon the border 
of the forest, the wood having been only partially cut 
away. In a few years other members of the little 
community died, one after another, at intervals, and 
they were also buried here, until the spot had gradually 
taken its present character of a burying ground. 
The rubbish was cleared away, place was made for 
those who nuist follow, and ere many years had passed 
the brick walls of a little church rose within the enclo- 
sure, and were consecrated to the worship of the 
Almighty. And thus this piece of ground was set 
apart for its solemn purposes, while shaded by the 
woods, and ere it had been appropriated to common 
uses: the soil was first broken by the spade of the 
grave-digger, and Death is the only reaper who has 
gathered his harvest here. The spot soon lost its 
forest character, however, for the older trees were all 
felled; possibly some among them may have been used 
as timber in building the little church. Happily, at the 
time of clearing the ground, a few young bushes were 
spared from the axe, and these, having been left to 
grow at will, have become fine flourishing trees. The 



The Story of the Churchyard 33 

greater number are pines, and a more fitting tree for a 
Christian churchyard than the white j^ine of America 
could scarcely be named. With all the gravity and 
unchanging character of an evergreen, they have not 
the dull gloom of the cypress or the yew; their growth 
is noble, and more than any variety of their tribe, they 
hold murmuring communion with the mysterious 
winds, waving in tones of subdued melancholy over 
the humble graves at their feet. A few maples and 
elms appear among them, relieving their monotonous 
character. Some of these have been planted for 
that purpose, but the pines themselves are all the 
spontaneous growth of the soil. Judging from their 
size, and what we know of their history, they must 
have sprung up from the seed about the time when the 
first colonists arrived — contemporaries of the little 
town whose graves they overshadow." 

The oldest tomb in the churchyard, to which 
Miss Cooper refers, stands rather inconspicuously 
among others near the centre of the enclosure. 
It bears this inscription: 

Here lies 
SAM'^ GRIFFIN, 
Son of JOSEPH GRIFFIN: 

Who Died Oct', 11th A.D. 1792 
Aged 4 years and 6 months. 
Happy Infant early bleft! 
Here in peaceful slumber, reft; 
Early refcu'd from the Cares 
Which increafe with growing years 




riidto by IVIfer 



The burial of this child fixed the site of Christ Church " 



The Sfory of the VhurcJiijard 35 

It is of curious interest to reflect that the 
burial of this Httle child, too feeble in years to 
make an impress upon the community, determined, 
in the process of time, the location of the first 
burial ground, with all the graves, nota})le and 
nameless, which it contains, fixed the site of 
Christ church, and set the axis of future parochial 
activity. 

Christ churchyard is singularly fortunate in 
the sul^dued harmony of the memorials which it 
contains. The most obnoxious crimes against 
art are usually found in public cemeteries. In 
no other field is such unbridled license given to 
the permanent expression of bad taste. Criti- 
cism stands dumb })efore grotesque and mawkish 
monuments to the dead, since they are eft'orts to 
give outward form to genuine grief and love. 
Without any artistic qualification except sincerity, 
the mourner too often causes to be imaged in 
everlasting marble some crude hallucination of 
his sorrow. 

In Christ churchyard, while there are some 
monuments that one might wish otherwise, the 
general charm of effect is not disturbed bv anv 
individual atrocity of design. Almost the only 
varieties of form that depart from the usual 
headstone are found in the recumbent slab, and 
the sarcophagus, or chest -like tomb, both of which 



36 The Storij of the Churchyard 

have repose and dignity. The earher headstones 
suggest forcibly that the common field-stone of 
which they were made is much better material 
for the purpose than the more ambitious marble 
of a later day. It mellows into lovely tones with 
the passing years, while the marble only soils and 
grows dirty with age. Its surface is softer to the 
eye than marble. It yields itself more gracefully 
to inscription, and the lettering is more legible 
and permanent. 

A good example of this old fashioned sort of 
tombstone is that of the first adult in the village 
who died a natural death. It is inscribed as 
follows : 

MR. JAMES N. BARBER 
Died of Small-Pox, January 27th, 1795. 
Aged 46 years; 
To whofe Memory this Stone is erected 
By his Son David Barber. 



The Soul, from Life's fuperfluous cares enlarg'd 
Its Debt of human Toil and Pain difcharged, 
Resigns the Body to its Native Clay, 
And to an unknown fome where wings its way. 



Orientated Graves 

The practice of Iniiying in churches or church- 
yards is said to l)e connected with the custom of 
praying for the dead; certainly it is ahnost as 
ancient. In England, it was as early as the year 
750, according to Lord Stowell, that "spaces of 
ground adjoining the churches were carefully 
enclosed and solemnly consecrated to the burial 
of those who had been entitled to attend divine 
service in those churches, and who now became 
entitled to render back into those places their 
remnants to earth, the common mother of man- 
kind, without payment for the ground which they 
were to occupy, or for the pious offices which 
solemnized the act of interment." 

Equally ancient must be reckoned the cus- 
tom of burying the dead with the feet to the 
East. Aside from the Christian tradition, 
there has been, among many races and tribes 
throughout the world, a remarkable consensus 
of custom for the practice of laying the body 
east and west, sometimes with the head to 
the east and sometimes to the west. This custom 



38 Orientated Graves 

is said to be due originally to solar symbolism, and 
the head is turned to the east or to the west, 
according as the dead are thought of in connec- 
tion with the sunrise, the reputed home of deity, 
or with the sunset, the reputed region of the dead. 

The Christian faith, however, gave a new 
significance to this matter. The Christian dead 
were laid in the grave with face upward and feet 
to the east, in token of the Resurrection at the 
coming again of the Sun of Righteousness. The 
custom arose from the thought that at the Second 
Coming of Christ, in the East, the dead, as a 
mighty army all facing one way, shall rise to 
greet him. In Wales the east wind is still called 
"The wind of the dead men's feet." 

Christ churchyard has had regard to this tradi- 
tion in the disposal of its graves. The dead lie 
with their feet eastward. Yet, since the graves 
naturally follow the parallel of the enclosure, 
which is not exactly east and west, but conforms 
to the general bent of the village, they fall short, 
by a few points of the compass, of facing due east. 

Among the early settlers of Cooperstown there 
was one family not to be put off with any vague- 
ness of orientation. It was that of Joshua Starr, 
a potter, whom Fenimore Cooper describes as 
"a respectable inhabitant of the village." To 
his mind it was plain that if a proper grave should 



Orientated (irares 



39 



face east, it should face the east, and not east by 
south. In him was the courage of conviction, 
and no slavish deference to majorities. Accord- 
ingl}^ the graves of the Starr family are notable 
among the tombs of Christ churchyard in being 




Photo by Telfer 

" Not to be put off with any vagueness of orientation " 

set with the foot due east, as by a mariner's 
compass. The wide headstones split the plane of 
the meridian; their edges cleave the noon-day 
sun and the Polar star. To the casual observer 
these three tombs, as compared with all others 
in the churchyard, seem quite awry. In reality 
thev alone are correct; all the rest are wrong. 



A Frolicsome Epitaph 

Objects of mirth are not sought in graveyards. 
Yet there is one tomb in Christ churchyard over 
which there has been laughter more than tears. 
It is the grave of Jenny York, a negro slave, 
whose tombstone appears at the east end of the 
churchyard, in the part reserved for the burial of 
members of her race, of whom there were a number 
in Cooperstown in early days. Among the more 
prosperous colonists some were slaveholders, and 
the institution was not yet regarded with general 
disapproval. On the day before the consecration 
of Christ church, in 1810, the following advertise- 
ment appeared in the Otsego Herald, one of the 
Cooperstown newspapers : 

FOR SALE. 

(For want of employment) 

A stout healthy negro, 18 years of age. He has been 
used to farming business. For terms inquire of this 
office. 

The same new^spaper stated, under the date of 
October 13, 1810, that there were then twenty- 




Photo by Telfur 

"One tomb over which there has been more laughter 
than tears " 



42 A Frolicsome Epitaph 

four negroes in the village, of whom twelve were 
slaves. 

Jenny York was a cook in the family of the 
Hon. Samuel Nelson, for many years a justice of 
the United States Supreme Court and a resident 
of Cooperstown. Like many of her kind, Jenny 
combined great culinary skill with a keen sense 
of property-right in whatever passed through her 
hands. Choice provisions and delicacies disap- 
peared through systematic dole at the kitchen 
door, or sometimes being reserved against a 
holiday, re-appeared to furnish forth a banquet in 
the servants' hall, to which Jenny's dusky friends 
were bidden, and made the welkin ring with 
wassail and good cheer. 

The current story is that, when Jenny died, 
the negroes of the village chose for her grave an 
epitaph to extol, without altogether approving, 
her left-handed generosity. The stone is inscribed 
as follows: 

JENNY YORK 

Died Feb. 22, 1837. 

Aet. 50 yea. 

She had her faults 

but 
was kind to the poor. 



Churchyard Miscellanea 

There are two kinds of men; those who love 
churchyards, and those who care for them not 
at all. Both kinds visit Christ churchyard, and 
the classification is automatic. Some glance at 
Cooper's grave and haste away with an air of 
duty done. The lovers of churchyards linger, 
and stroll thoughtfully among the tombs. They 
find a charm in the most obscure memorials of 
the dead. They read aloud to each other the 
quaint inscriptions. Now and again they pause 
to copy some chiseled epitaph that strikes the 
fancy. They kneel or lie prone upon the turf 
before a crumbling tomb to decipher its doleful 
couplets, thrusting aside the concealing grasses, 
lest a word be missed. They wander at will 
beneath the trees, and, before departing, enter 
the old church, to rest and pray within the still- 
ness of its fane. For such there are delights in 
Christ churchyard that lean not at all upon famous 
names or the pomps and vanities of history. 

The tombs are rich in verse. Few of us, in 
modern times, would dare to submit stanzas of 



(liu rchya rd Mi.scellan ea 45 

our own composition to be inscribed in cold stone 
everlastingly. We should be thankful that our 
forefathers, in this matter as in much else, were 
more courageous. We could ill spare the poetry 
of old churchyards. 

A marble that fronts the walk between the 
church and chapel is inscribed with a verse that 
touches upon the motive of all churchyard poetry. 
It is dedicated by his parents to Joseph Temple, 
an only son, who died in 1807, in the twenty-first 
year of his age. 

Go then blest shade where bliss 

sincere is known 
Go where to love and to injoy are one 
Yet take these tears mortalities relief 
And till I share your joys forgive my 

grief 
Of love sincere oh this last pledge 
receive 
x\ stone a verse is all I have to give. 

« 

In this view, it is not the quality of the verse, 
but its necessity as a proper tribute to the dead 
that justifies its existence. Poetry and stone are 
forms of homage. 

The churchyard contains, of course, a variant 
of the couplet that is seen everywhere and always 
in cemeteries. It appears upon a stone a few feet 



46 Churchyard Miscellanea 

to the east of the Cooper enclosure, commemoratmg 
an infant who died in 1799. 

From Death's areft no age is free; 
Prepare to die and follow me. 

This is not so lugubrious as its more usual form: 

As I am now, so you shall be; 
Prepare to die and follow me. 

The oldest epitaph but one in Christ churchyard 
is that of Jabez Wight , a cabinet-maker, who was 
drowned while bathing in the lake, July 14, 1794. 
Of the original settlers he w\is the first adult to 
meet death. The stone stands near the one last 
mentioned, and bears these lines: 

Death, like an overflowing ftream. 
Sweeps us away; our life's a dream: 
An emty tale, a morning iiower, 
Cut down and wither'd in an hour. 

Evidently this effusion was much admired, for 
it reappears upon the tombstone of Jeremy Sumers, 
a child who died in 18*28, and whose grave lies 
at the corner of the Tiffany plot, which is sur- 
rounded by a small square of iron fence just south 
of the Cooper enclosure. 



I 



Churchyard Miscellanea 47 

The Rev. Frederick T. Tiffany, second rector 
of Christ church, and sometime chaplain of the 
House of Representatives, may probaV)ly })e re- 
garded as the author of the hues which appear 
upon the tomb of his daughter, Mary, who died 
at the age of seventeen years. The verses deal 
with one of the special problems of faith, touching 
the recognition of loved ones in a future life. 

And shall we eVr again thy features trace, 

Beloved child! thy lineaments review.^ 

Yes, though the sunken eyes and livid hue, 

And lips comprest, have quenched each lively grace, — 

Death's triumph — Still we recognize the face 

Which thine for many a year affection knew. 

And what forbids that, clothed with life anew. 

It still on memory's tablet holds its place.'* 

Tho' then thy cheek with deathless bloom be sheen, 

And rays of splendor wreathe thy saintlike brow, 

That change, we deem, shall sever not between 

Thee and thy former self; nor disallow 

That love's tried eyes discern thee through the skreen 

Of glory then, as of corruption now. 

In the third tier east of the Tiffany enclosure 
a curious use of verse appears upon two stones, 
whereby Captain Joseph Jones and his wife 
Keziah, both dying in 1799, seem to converse in 



48 Churchyard Miscellanea 

responsive couplets. Mrs. Jones avers majestic- 
ally, 

Within this Silent grave I ly. 

to which the hero of battles quite meekly replies, 
This fpace is all I occupy. 

An epitaph that wavers uncertainly between 
verse and prose fronts the walk between the 
church and chapel: 

Albert O how lonely 

We are here without our son 

And we hope again to meet thee 

Around our heavenly father's 

Home. 

The very crudeness of some epitaphs seems to 
emphasize their terrible sincerit}^ Here is one 
just south of the Tiffany plot, 

Mourn not since freed from 

human ills, 
My dearest friends & two 

Infants still. 
My consumptive pains God 

semed well, 
My soul to prepair with 

him to dwell 




- r^ 




50 Churchyard Miscellanea 

Northward of this tomb is a sarcophagus 
that shows a well-laid plan in a state of imper- 
ishable incompletion. Besides a memorial of the 
dead, the tomb was intended to be a kind of 
family record. The names of children and grand- 
children were inscribed, and as they departed 
this life their names were marked with a chiseled 
asterisk referring to a footnote which pronounced 
them "dead." Four deaths were so recorded; 
then the sculptured enrollment was discontinued. 
Written still among the living there remain four 
names, of those who have been long dead, while 
the name of one born since the monument was 
erected, survivor of all the rest, was never included 
in the memorial. 

One of the five flat stones near the driveway, 
not far from the church door, bears an epitaph 
which, while eulogizing a wife, gives an unpre- 
meditated characterization of its composer: 

She passed through life and from life to death, without 
the reproach of the world or her own conscience, and 
the remembrance of her virtues is fondly cherished by 
him to whose happiness in the endearing scenes of wed- 
lock, they essentially^ contributed. 

On the next tomb but one is engraved a fervent 
appeal to the sympathy of the passer-by: 



Churchyard Miscellanea 51 

Stranger hadst thou ever a wife, 
Snatched from thee by death, 
In the bloom of youth beauty and virtue 
' I If thou never hadst 

Thou mightest immagine 
' , But cannot feel 

The anguish of a disconsolate husband 

Who has placed over her remains 
This tablet as the last but too feeble testimony 
of his tenderest affections 
And to mark the spot where lies the best of wives 
The most affectionate of mothers 
And the sincerest of friends. 

Northeast of this group, the tomb of Mrs. 
Sarah Miinn, standing somewhat alone, relates 
with a certain archaic gracefulness, that 

She lean'd her head on Jesus' breast, 
And breath'd her life out sweetly. 

Near the orientated tombs of the Starrs is the 
grave of an infant who died in 1794, and whose 
epitaph breathes both love and trustful resignation : 

Sleep on fweet babe; injoy thy reft: 
God call'd the foon, he faw it beft. 

A more severe view of the Deity appears upon 
a gravestone six rows east of this, commemora- 
ting James and Tamson Eaton, who died in 1846. 



52 Churchyard Miscellanea 

Tamson was fifteen years of age, and despite 
the name, was a girl, as the verse reveals: 

This youth cut down in all her bloom, 
Sent by her God to an early doom. 

James, aged twenty-one years, was evidently 
killed by lightning, and the event is thus poetized: 

What voice is that? 'Tis God, 
He speaketh from the clouds; 
In thunder is concealed the rod 
That smites him to the ground. 

Next to this is a tomb which reflects a cheerful 
stoicism : 

Adieu my friends dry up your tears 
Here I must lye till Christ appears. 

In the second tier east is a stone bearing this 
sentiment : 

Friends nor physicians 
could not save. 
This mortal body from 

the grave, 
Nor can the grave con- 
fine it here, 
When Christ commands 
it to appear. 

The next tomb but one to the striking Carter 
memorial cross, recumbent near the border of the 



Churchyard Miscellanea 53 

driveway, is that of Mary Olendorf, and bears 
these feehng hnes: 

Tread softly o'er this sacred mound 
For Mary hes beneath this ground 
May garlands deck and myrtles rise 
To guard the Tomb where Mary lies. 

In the midst of the second row to the east a 
brownstone of singularly beautiful hue marks 
the grave of Sally Huntington and is inscribed 
with an epitaph that has the ring of sincerity: 

This woman was full of 
Good works and Alms deeds 

She slept in Christ and with her dying breath 
Exulting triumphed o'er the sting of death 
Distinct th'o feebly with her faultring tongue 
The praises of Almighty God she sung 
Thus lived the best of women to the end 
The village favorite and the village friend. 

South of this is a fine specimen of the older sort 
of tombstones, dedicated to the memory of Cap- 
tain John Howard, a tanner, and the first militia 
captain of the village, who, in the summer of 
1799, was drowned in an heroic effort to save a 
man who had fallen beneath some flood wood in 
the Susquehanna. Says the epitaph: 



54 Churchyard Miscellanea 

Striving another's life to fave. 
He funk beneathe the fwelling 
wave. 

No grave in the churchyard except Cooper's 
receives more attention from strangers than that 
of Scipio, an old slave, whose beautifully let- 
tered tombstone is near that of Captain How- 
ard. It is inscribed as follows: 

In memory of Scipto, an aged slave, a native of 
Africa who died March 27th, 1799. 

Oft did he. Shivering, Call, to blefs the hand 
That would beftow a Cordial to his wants; 
Oft have I drop'd a tear to fee his forrow'd face 
Caft fmiles around, 
On thofe whofe feeling hearts 
Had, for a Minute 
Made him forget 
The Hardnefs of his fate. 

His venerable Beard was thin and white; 
His hoary Head befpoke his length of Days: 
His Piteous tales of Woe, 
While bending o'er his Staff, 

He did Relate 
Were heard in penfive Mood, 
By Thofe 
Who look'd beyond his tatter'd garb. 
And faw his Manv Sorrows. 



I 




Photo by Telfer 

" No grave, except Cooper's, receives more attention " 



56 Churchyard Miscellanea 

North of this stone, after passing three inter- 
vening tombs, one comes upon an odd inscription 
that marks the grave of a fourteen-year-old boy 
who was drowned December 3, 1810. 



Thus were Parents bereavd 
of a dutiful son and community 
of a promising youth, while 
pursuing with assiduity the 
act of industry. 



One might be curious to know what this act of 
industry was that cost the life of young Garrett 
Bissell, but history is silent. 

"Joe Tom," a negro whose tomb fronts the east 
end of the churchyard, was for more than a score 
of years sexton of Christ church, and when he 
died, in 1881, had been for half a century a unique 
figure in the life of the village. "Joe Tom" was 
always the general factotum at public entertain- 
ments and had won a title as "the politest negro 
in the world." Music of a lively sort he scraped 
from the fiddle or beat upon the triangle. He was 
chief usher at meetings, chief cook at picnics, a 
stentorian prompter at dances, and chief oar at 
lake excursions. On occasions of this latter kind 



C li u rcJiija rd M iscella nea 57 

it was "Joe Tom's" peculiar duty, assigned to 
him by nature in the gift of wondrous huigs, to 
awaken the famous Echo of the GHmmerglass. 
Stationing his scow at a point on the lake oppo- 
site to Natty Bumppo's cave, the negro would 
shout across the water, "Natty Bumppo! Natty 
Bumppo! Who's there?" and after a moment the 
cry would be flung back, as by the spirit of 
Leatherstocking, from the heights of the steep 
and rocky shore. On a still summer evening 
"Joe Tom" was sometimes able, by a single shout^ 
to call forth three distinct echoes which were heard 
in regular succession, the first from the cave, the 
second from Mount Vision, and the third from 
Hannah's hill on the opposite side of the lake, 
until the margin of the Glimmerglass seemed to 
resound with cries of "Natty Bumppo!" uttered 
by eerie voices. 

On the extreme southern border of the church- 
yard, about fifty feet from the street, there is a 
tombstone that seems to shudder away from 
human sight, shrinking behind the shelter of a 
tree, and clinging to the ragged skirts of the 
hedge. Whoever searches out this tomb cannot 
fail to be obsessed with the feeling that it is 
connected with some mystery, to which the 
inscription darkly alludes: 



o8 Churchyard Miscellanea 

In memory of 

Abraham Spafard. 

Who died at 8 o, 

clock P. M. 3d. Sep* 1827. 

in the 49 ' year of 

his age 

The trump shall sound, 

and the dead shall 

be raised. 

Why eight o'clock? What is the significance 
of this concern to perpetuate the memory of the 
exact hour of death? The truth is that at just 
eight o'clock on the evening of September the 
third, in the year of Our Lord 1827, Abraham 
Spafard was brutally murdered. He was killed 
by Levi Kelly, a farmer of the town of Otsego, a 
man noted for his violent temper, from the effects 
of which Spafard was attempting to shield a boy 
when Kelly shot him dead. Kelly was executed 
at a public hanging on a lot not far from the site 
of the present High School, December 28, 1827. 
Throngs of people gathered from the whole 
countryside to witness the hanging, some bringing 
their children to profit by the dreadful object- 
lesson. So much was the hanging regarded as an 
interesting and legitimate public spectacle that a 
large temporary staging, designed to afford space 



I 



Churchyard Miscellanea 59 

for six hundred people, was erected for the 
accommodation of spectators. Just before the 
execution this staging became so overweighted 
that it collapsed, killing two men, and injuring 
upwards of a score. 

Kelly's body was buried in that part of the 
churchyard which belongs to the Cooper family. 
No stone was ever raised to mark the place of 
Levi Kelly's burial, and time has obliterated all 
traces of his grave. Yet that his bones are here 
interred is not less certain than that the body of 
his victim lies in another quarter of the church- 
yard, beneath the stone that names the hour of 
crime. The murderer and the murdered sleep 
beneath the shadow of the same sanctuary, 
awaiting the Day of Judgment. To that Great 
Assize the tomb of Abraham Spafard makes 
appeal for both, in the words of a Faith that 
promises not justice, but mercy, to us all: 

The trump shall sound, 

and the dead shall 

be raised. 



A Churchyard F'uneral 

Ir is seldom, in modern life, that the full beauty 
of the Order for the Burial of the Dead is realized. 
In the customary usage of the day the Burial 
Office of the Book of Common Prayer must be 
rudely disjointed by necessary adjournment, for 
the latter part of the ritual, to some distant 
cemetery. The service is interrupted in the 
midst by an incongruous clatter of coaches and a 
tedious loading up of carriages at the church door. 

The Burial Office was composed at a time when 
interments of the dead were commonly made in 
churchyards. Throughout the ritual the cir- 
cumstance of the churchyard is assumed. The 
rubrical direction at the beginning of the Office 
says, "The Minister, meeting the Corpse at the 
entrance of the Churchyard, and going before it, 
either into the Church or towards the Grave, 
shall say or sing, I am the resurreciion and the life, 
saith the Lord: he that belieiwth in me, though he 
were dead, yet shatl he live: and whosoever liveth arid 
believeth in me, shall never die. The order is then 
given for that portion of the service intended to 



A Churchyard Funeral 61 

be rendered in the church, which would inckide, 
according to the more ancient custom, the 
Requiem Mass; then is set forth the ritual to be 
used at the grave. 

In this Order for Burial there is a unity of design 
that becomes manifest only when, as in olden times, 
interment is made in the yard adjoining the church, 
where the outdoor function appears as a natural 
sequence to the service of the sanctuary, and is 
connected w^ith it by an orderly processional from 
the church to the churchyard. 

Christ churchyard, in the full glory of its Summer 
foliage, offers a superb setting for such a service, 
and the now rare occasions of interments Avithin 
this quaint God's acre are long remembered by 
those who witness them. After the service in the 
church the procession of choir and clergy, headed 
by the crucifer, issues from the main door, followed 
by the bearers carrying the bier upon their shoul- 
ders. The mourners and the remainder of the 
congregation come reverently after, and with the 
thrilling chorus of some triumphant resurrection- 
hymn the procession moves slowly to the grave. 
The sunshine sifts through the foliage of the over- 
arching trees, glitters upon the processional cross, 
gleams upon the white robes of choristers, and 
transforms into a mantle of glory the pall that 
drapes the body of the dead. At the grave, the 




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A Churchyard Funeral 63 

dirge-like anthem l)e(>iniiing "Man that is born of 
a woman'' is less lngul)rioiis when well sung than 
as commonly read, and adds a more uplifting 
quality to this portion of the service. A solemn 
hush falls upon the company as the priest steps 
forward for the formal act of burial. The dust 
flashes momentarily in the sunbeams as it falls 
from his hand into the open grave, while the 
rhythmic cadences of the committal float once 
again over the consecrated ground. No words 
in the English tongue have vibrated more deeply 
in human hearts than the majestic and exultant 
avowal of faith with which the Church consigns 
to the grave the bodies of her dead: 

"Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God, in 
His wise providence, to take out of this world the 
soul of our deceased brothier, we therefore commit 
his body to the ground; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, 
dust to dust; looking for the general Resurrection in 
the last day, and the life of the world to come, through 
our Lord Jesus Christ; at whose second coming in 
glorious majesty to judge the world, the earth and the 
sea shall give up their dead; and the corruptible 
bodies of those who sleep in Him shall be changed, and 
made like unto His own glorious body; according to 
the mighty working whereby He is able to sul^due all 
things unto Himself." 



The Church 

"On a Saturday afternoon in midsummer I 
found myself by chance on the Southern shores 
of Otsego Lake, looking northward on a scene 
which for quiet and soothing beauty can hardly 
be surpassed. Before me lay the mirror of the 
Glimmerglass ; warm lights threw a flush upon 
the skies; the day was going away; the omens 
of the evening were already in the clouds; a 
breeze, scarcely strong enough to ruffle the water, 
came from the western hills; the woods were 
reflected in their native colors along the silent 
shore. But below was more than what met the 
eye. Through and under this exterior beauty 
voices could be heard, speaking of the mystery 
of the natural world. * * * At such times 
and in such places men become aware of some 
unspeakable strangeness in their life, and, keep- 
ing silence before mysterious and dimly indicated 
presences, they know that it must be possible 
to draw its hidden meaning from God's w^orld, 
from hill and plain, from deep, still waters and 
shadowy woods, from the currents of the evening 



I 



The Church 



65 



breeze and the outstretched shadows of ebbing 
day. 

"Hard by that lake stands an old church, 
shaded by tall pines and other trees, and keeping 
watch and ward over the surrounding resting- 




Photo by Telfer 

" The omens of the evening were already in the clouds " 

places of the dead in Christ. On the following 
morning I found myself at the early celebration 
in that venerable fane. Here another mystery 
confronted us, like the other, too deep to search 
out; the mystery of the Coming of our Lord in 
Holv Communion. The church also, like the 



66 The Church 

lake, was held in the stillness of a holy peace. 
The voice of the priest, as he recited the office, 
was the only sound that broke upon the ear; the 
words of Christ were repeated; and then, to the 
eye of faith, 'came Jesus and stood in the midst, 
and said. Peace be unto 3^ou.' " 

These words referring to Otsego Lake and 
Christ church form the introductory paragraphs 
of "The Sacramental System," by the Rev. 
Morgan Dix, D. D., sometime rector of Trinity 
church, New^ York, who passed his boyhood in 
Cooperstown. The musings to which he gives 
utterance express, with poetic insight, the deeper 
feelings awakened in many a soul by this village 
church and the charm of its natural surroundings. 
What the lover of nature feels stirring within 
him as he penetrates the heart of the mysterious 
forest, this and more the lover of the Church is 
aware of when he enters a Christian sanctuary 
and kneels before an altar that mystically unites 
the history of Man and God. He who loves both 
Nature and the Church finds ever new delights 
on either hand, for each imparts continually fresh 
significance to the other, as being revelations, 
in difterent spheres, of the same Eternal Energy. 

Christ church was consecrated on July 8, 1810, 
by Bishop Benjamin Moore. The identical build- 
ing is still standing, most of the changes having 



The Church 67 

taken the form of additions to the original struc- 
tin"e. While the spire is of later date, the tower 
that it surmounts has remained unchanged from 
the first, with the exception of the buttresses, 
which both here and elsewhere on the exterior 
of the church were of more recent construction. 
The nave, exclusive of the present transept and 
chancel, constituted the original church. Tall 
white columns within the nave supported the roof 
until 1840, when the heavy brackets of native oak 
were constructed to sustain it, and a Gothic style 
began to be affected in the renewal of interior 
woodwork and a reshaping of the windows. The 
changes may be best understood by reference to 
the model of the original church which stands in 
the vestry room. This model was constructed 
by Mr. G. Pomeroy Keese, who died in the cen- 
tennial year of the parish, and having been w^arden 
for some years and vestryman for more than 
half a century was better informed than anyone 
else concerning the first one hundred years of the 
church's life; nor had the church and churchyard 
ever a more devoted lover. 

The transept was constructed in 186-1-, and the 
present chancel was added in 1891 as a memorial 
of Mrs. Jane R. A. Carter. The interior of the 
church is rich in memorials of those who have 
worshipped within its walls. The Altar, with 



The Church 69 

reredos, of Caen stone, was erected in 1910 in 
memory of the Rev. Philip A. H. Brown, late 
vicar of S. John's chapel, Varick Street, New York, 
and formerly rector in Cooperstown, where he 
was greatly beloved. 

The font, the earliest memorial placed in the 
church, commemorates ^Ir. Theodore Keese, war- 
den of the parish, who died in 1858. Superimposed 
upon the font and embedded in such wise that it 
holds the water used in Holy Baptism, is the 
original baptismal bow^l that w-as used in the 
church by the first rector. The bowl was given 
to the church by the Hon. Elijah H. Metcalf, a 
member of the original vestry, and after being 
discarded for half a century, during which it was 
put to various uses, the relic was restored to the 
church by Mrs. Sophia E. Blodgett, granddaughter 
of the donor. 

The organ, erected in 1909, is a memorial of 
the Rt. Rev. Henry C. Potter, D. D., seventh 
bishop of New York, who, during the summers 
of his latter years, regularly attended the services 
of Christ church. His last public appearance 
was in Christ church, when, not five weeks before 
his death, he read the prayers at the funeral of a 
youth. The personal dignity of the Bishop, his 
commanding presence, a certain picturesque mag- 
nificence, the strength of his countenance, the 



70 The Church 

incisiveness in his manner of speech, were char- 
acteristics that marked him as a leader of men, and 
dominated the many pubhc assembhes of which 
he was remembered as the central figure. Coopers- 
town associates such a memory of him with a 
scene rich in kaleidoscopic color and historic 
significance, when, on a Sunday afternoon dur- 
ing the village centennial celebration, multitudes 
listened beneath the sunlit trees upon the green, 
while the Bishop, mantled in an academic gown 
of crimson, described his vision of the future of 
religion in America. The Bishop did not live to 
see the fulfilment of his prophecies, but died, 
within a year, in this peaceful village, which always 
touched him with its charm, and where, after all 
that the wider world accorded him, he was most 
intimately known and sincerely loved. 

The Litany desk of carved oak commemorates 
Francis Upton Johnstone, M. D., who became 
a vestryman in 1871. 

On the right-hand side of the nave, as one 
enters the church, the middle window is a memorial 
of ^liss b-'usan Fenimore Cooper, who died in 1894. 
A daughter of the novelist, INIiss Cooper's memory 
is revered in Cooperstown for qualities all her own. 
She gained rather more than local fame, in her 
time, as a graceful writer, and was distinguished 
for her knowledge of the birds and flowers of 



The Church 71 

Otsego hills. The memorial window, with its 
figure of Charity distributing alms to children, 
sets forth the aspect of her character which 
won for Miss Cooper the grateful regard of 
posterity. Her life-work was the establishment in 
Cooperstown of the Orphan House of the Holy 
Saviour, where, since 1870, homeless and destitute 
children from far and near, many of them rescued 
from unspeakably evil influences, have received 
Christian care and nurture. Nor shall it be for- 
gotten that, while others gave more largely of 
funds, the Thanksgiving Hospital, one of the 
most useful village institutions, founded in grati- 
tude for the close of the Civil War, originated in 
Miss Cooper's heart and mind. The memorial 
window idealizes in form and color the spirit of 
this noble woman, without attempting portraiture. 
A real likeness of Miss Cooper, as she appeared in 
her ripest years, would recall a sweet face framed 
in dangling curls, a manner somewhat prim but 
always gentle and placid, a figure slight and spare, 
with a bonnet and Paisley shawl that are all but 
essential to the resemblance. She would be l)est 
represented in the midst of orphan children whom 
she catechises for the benefit of some visiting 
dignitary, while the little rascals, taking advantage 
of her growing deafness, titter forth the most pal- 
pable absurdities in reply, sure of her benignant 



\ 



72 The Church 

smile and commendatory "Very good; very good, 
indeed!" 

The screens of native oak in the two archways 
that open into the church on either side of the 
chancel have an interesting history. They were 
reconstructed in 1910 from a screen erected in 
1840, in what Avas then the chancel, by Mr. James 
Fenimore Cooper, the novelist. This screen, and 
the changes in the interior of the church already 
mentioned as belonging to the period, are referred 
to in a letter dated "Hall, Cooperstown, April 
22nd, 1840" and addressed by Mr Cooper to 
Harmanus Bleecker, Esq.: 

I have just been revolutionizing Christ church, 
Cooperstown, * * * converting its pine interior into 
oak — bona fide oak, and erecting a screen that I trust, 
though it may have no influence on my soul, will 
carry my name down to posterity. It is really a 
pretty thing — pure Gothic, and is the wonder of the 
country round. 

This screen remained in the church, with some 
alterations, until 1891. 

For the present purpose the screen was divided, 
the panels were cut out, allowing a vista through 
the tracery, and the design was skillfully adjusted 
to the necessities. Of the tw^o screens thus 
resulting from reconstruction the one on the 



The Church 73 

organ side is the least altered in design and 
material from the original, and is a memorial of 
Judge William Cooper, the founder of Cooperstown. 
The other was erected in memory of Mr. Paul 
Fen i more Cooper. 

Passing through the gates of this screen one 
finds in the Vestry room some historic memorials 
of the church. Besides the model of the original 
edifice, there are portraits of the Bishops of 
Albany, and of all the Bishops of New York who 
had jurisdiction in the parish before the erection 
of this Diocese, together with portraits of all 
rectors of Christ church, up to the present time. 
The most valuable portrait is an old oil painting 
of Father Nash, first rector of the parish. 

Many inquiries are made by visitors concerning 
the location of P'enimore Cooper's pew. The 
identical pew is no longer in existence, but, in the 
transept, the side pew which is now nearest to 
the pulpit occupies practically the same position. 
In Cooper's day the present chancel, it must be 
remembered, did not exist. The space which 
now lies between the chancel steps and the front 
pews was occupied by a platform at the rear of 
which, in the midst, backed by the oaken screen, 
stood the altar and puli)it. This platform did 
not extend entirely across the end of the church, 
but was flanked on either side by two pews placed 



74 The Church 

sidewise. On the left, as one faced the platform, 
the two pews were occupied by the families, 
respectively, of Richard Cooper and Judge Nelson, 
associate justice of the United States Supreme 
Court, whose memorial tablet now adorns the 
adjacent wall. Of the two pews on the right of 
the platform the first was assigned to the Pomeroy 
family, and the second was that of James Fenimore 
Cooper. 

There is one aspect of Christ church and 
churchyard that lies quite beyond the imagination 
of those who journey thither only in Summertime. 
Winter reserves a splendor of its ow^n for Christ 
churchyard. The immaculate veil which nature 
draws by stealth across the view adds a sense of 
mystery in concealment. Of a winter's night, 
when the moon rides the heavens, her beams 
transfigure the homely old church, which seems to 
look down upon the mantled graves in an attitude 
of majestic benediction. 




Photo by W. H. Yates (Taken at mkhiiglit Viy moonlifrlit) 

" The moonbeams transfigure the old church " 



JUN 13 19H 



One copy del. to Cat. Div. 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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